Exit Music
by The Sugarfaerie
Summary: I read the news today, oh boy... Andromeda remembered everything about those days, and memories were all she had left. She only wanted more time, time with those who mattered, but now that time was gone. Post Deathly Hallows, Andromeda character study.


This is a little tribute to Andromeda, whom I always found fascinating, and Ted, Tonks and Remus, may they rest in literary peace.

Disclaimer: don't own HP. If I did, Remus and Tonks would still be alive and I wouldn't have cried my eyes out. I also don't own any songs I reference in this.

Exit Music 

When the Black sisters were young, their mother would order them to make their beds every morning, reasoning that the incantations required would train them for being good housewives later on. It was unnecessary, of course, given that the girls would most certainly have house elves, but their mother had been forced to do the same as a child and didn't see why her daughters should have it any easier. So they stood beside their little beds for inspection every morning, heads held down until they were permitted to go to breakfast. First would be Bellatrix, cruel and ruthless even then, who only did the minimum amount of work and still somehow managed to get away with it. At the far end would be Narcissa, the perfect daughter, every folded sheet knife-sharp. In the middle, impatiently tapping her toe against the woodwork; was Andromeda, who cut corners in her chores but, unlike her elder sister, wasn't very good at concealing it.

At Hogwarts, Bellatrix excelled amongst her fellow Slytherins, encouraging the attention from children of great families and rejecting those who were not. Narcissa's soft gold curls won her a fair share of admirers. Andromeda, always merely the middle sister, made a name for herself at sixteen when she kissed a Ravenclaw boy behind the greenhouses.

The boy's name was Ted Tonks and he was a Muggleborn.

The Howler at breakfast made things clear enough. Andromeda, staring resolutely at her toast, was pelted with claims that she had disgraced her parents, her sisters, yes, the pure, ancient blood that ran in her veins. She had endangered her sisters' marriage prospects, and she herself was ruined, because what family would want someone who had willing consorted with such a lesser being?

She returned home over Easter and sat on her meticulous bed, listening to Narcissa swoon over Lucius Malfoy. She twirled a daisy in her hand and counted the checks on her blanket.

The next day Andromeda wrote a letter to Ted Tonks and sent it by the owl she had received for Christmas. She didn't care if it was found. His reply was short, written in neat block letters with a coffee stain at the bottom. _Come and visit me, _he pleaded, including a tiny pin badge with the note. Andromeda smiled at it; it was some Muggle band he was fascinated with. Led Zeppelin or something like that.

Years later the badge was rusty and the pin had fallen off. The rust left smudges on her hands.

She managed to lose her sisters shopping in London and stood basking in the lights of Piccadilly Circus. At last! Now to find Ted.

The address he had written her was clear enough and it didn't take Andromeda very long to find it. The Tonks' home was whitewashed with straggly weeds for a garden, and music blared from one of the back windows. Andromeda crouched to peek through the glass and saw Ted, magnificently dressed in a striped shirt with a flared collar and brown corduroys, dancing to some Muggle music with no apparent knowledge of the world.

"_The Magical Mystery Tour," _he sang with the music. His brown hair reached his shoulders and flew about his face as he jiggled, waving his arms. Andromeda laughed. "_The Magical Mystery Tour is coming to take you away…_"

His voice wavered off-key and Ted finished with some spectacular moves he had described to her as 'air guitar'. "_The Magical Mystery Tour…_" His air-guitar turned him towards the window and face-to-face with Andromeda. She didn't duck. To hell with her parents and their rules. Let them fuss over Bella's wedding and Cissy's hair. Andromeda was no broodmare to be paired with anyone they chose.

Ted slid the window open, a blush creeping over his face. "Dromeda?" His surprise almost made him shout.

Andromeda studied her shoes, kicking at an unoffending pebble in the garden. "Hi," she whispered, swallowing. Ted gaped at her, one hand frantically trying to smooth the creases in his shirt. Finally Andromeda worked up the courage to speak again. "Can I come in?"

Ted seemed to consider this for a moment. "My parents are out," he decided, holding his hand out to her. Andromeda took it and clambered over the sill. Ted's room was delightfully messy, covered in posters and the bric-a-brac of a Muggle teenager. A sweet-smelling cigarette smoked in an ashtray Ted hurriedly tipped out into the waste paper bin.

Ted stopped smoking when Nymphadora was born, saying it wasn't good for his only daughter ("And the best daughter there's ever been!"). Andromeda wrote to both her sisters, begging them to come for tea and see the baby. She never received a reply. Andromeda pressed her lips together, gathered Nymphadora in her arms and said nothing to her husband. Ted smiled from the kitchen counter and placed a disc on his record player. "David Bowie," he said, by way of explanation.

"Oh." Andromeda settled Nymphadora onto her lap and flicked through Witches' Weekly. A bright blue spot advertised a sample of the latest Hobgoblins song if you pressed your wand to it. Andromeda did so. The song sounded remarkably similar to the one Ted was singing along to. _And they say we get nothing from Muggles…_

She never did speak to her sisters, but Andromeda still declared that life was pleasant. She settled into the Muggle suburb, cleaning the house and taking Nymphadora on walks along the Thames. Nymphadora bounced along in her purple anorak, throwing bread to the ducks and asking questions about everything. Andromeda followed, holding Ted's hand like lovers often do.

They passed a Muggle woman sitting beneath a tree, her hair an impossible shade of red, wearing a battered jacket and a gypsy skirt. A small table stood in front of her with boxes of little papers, and two colourful canaries plucked the thin strips and dropped them into people's hands.

"Let the birdies tell your fortune," Nymphadora read carefully, her face crumpled with concentration. Nymphadora was proud of being able to read. "Oh Mum, can I have one?"

Andromeda threw a critical glance at the canaries. "They don't work, Dora," she answered, trying to hold her daughter back. "No magic."

"Oh, go on," Ted whispered into her ear. "What's the harm?"

Sighing, Andromeda gave the woman a penny and Nymphadora got her fortune. She became distracted by an ice-cream van and never read it.

Many years later and Andromeda was alone again, sitting at her table with a mug of tea, a grandchild and no family. In just a few months she become a widow, a grandmother and finally a guardian to a parentless child. Her fairytale was over.

The death toll was high, so the funeral eulogies were kept general to prevent their poor readers from becoming confused and making embarrassing errors. The man at Nymphadora's funeral droned about her noble sacrifice, her bravery and loyalty even in the face of death, as if being killed by her aunt was the only thing worthy of note. There was no mention of the girl who changed her hair colour ten times a day, who always tripped on the stairwell and forced her husband to tango about the kitchen. Just another honoured corpse. Andromeda had wrung her shawl between her fingers, wanting to leap up and demand to know where her daughter was, because that shell they were burying could never be her.

Andromeda clutched her mug, not taking a single sip. It was already cold.

On impulse, she got up and went to Ted's old desk, where his record collection proudly stood. She selected one, to kill the silence as she searched through her husband's things.

She unlocked a draw and gave a cry. A badge, rusty with the pin fallen off. A paper fortune, crumpled. Ticket stubs. Concert programs. A detritus of memories. She hadn't looked at them since Lee Jordan announced Ted's death, oh, years ago now, it seemed.

I read the news today, oh boy… 

Andromeda fell to her knees, fingering the badge in her hand. She could hardly read its words now. She didn't need to. She remembered them. Oh how she did.

_And though the news was rather sad… Well, I just had to laugh._

An old photograph, complete with a water stain. Young Nymphadora still waved from behind the spot. Andromeda's nails scratched it, she gripped onto it so hard. Her bent knees ached on the rough carpet, and she wasn't as fit as she was then. So reckless, so brave. She had almost forgotten what it felt like, until her daughter showed up on the doorstep with an unsuitable marriage of her own. Andromeda sniffed and polished the wedding portrait. Her son-in-law grinned sheepishly back at her, hands hidden deep in the pockets of his rented suit.

Behind her, the music of another age rang out from the scratchy record, calling back memories too painful to ignore. She would give everything to relive those days, when she was young and in love and could triumph over the world. When they could lie on their back in the park, Ted and Andromeda, Andromeda and Ted, trying to see shapes in the clouds whilst brushing flies from each other's faces. When Nymphadora would rush towards them through the grass, her hair a blinding pink, brandishing a dandelion like it was the most important discovery in the universe. _I want more time… Please, let me have more time._

A baby's cry pulled Andromeda back into the living room. She would see them again one day, she knew. She would kiss Ted and hug Dora and shake Remus's hand.

And it was a long, long road.


End file.
